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by Peggy Aycinena - Contributing EditorPosted anew every four weeks or so, the EDA WEEKLY delivers to its readers information concerning the latest happenings in the EDA industry, covering vendors, products, finances and new developments. Frequently, feature articles on selected public or private EDA companies are presented. Brought to you by EDACafe.com. If we miss a story or subject that you feel deserves to be included, or you just want to suggest a future topic, please contact us! Questions? Feedback? Click here. Thank you!

** Somewhere between the hospitality and opportunities at DATE, and the snow and/or labor problems that confounded travel to DATE, one might see a kind of symbolism with respect to EDA.

The EDA industry is awash in gemütlichkeit and hospitality - great friendships and long-term relationships - and rich in compelling technology. Yet at the same time, the industry is snowbound and riddled with angst, by forces beyond its control, and by business practices and legal disputes within its control, all of which consistently threaten to prevent forward progress.

If the EDA industry wants to move ahead, it needs to accentuate the gemütlichkeit and de-centuate the angst - accentuate the cordiality and de-centuate disturbing business practices that create short-term gains for one company at the cost of long-term diminishment of the industry overall. Yes, squabbling is unavoidable. But as evidenced by the history of Europe over the last 100 years or DATE over the last week, either we're all in this together or everyone loses. This should the biggest take-away from DATE and fully worth the effort to get there - snow or no snow.

Things I liked least at DATE:

* The program - it was confusing and hard to follow.

* People suggesting that they need to choose between DATE and DAC.

* The booths on the outside of the exhibit hall - they seemed vaguely reminiscent of a high-school science fair. Put them inside next time.

Things I liked best at DATE:

* The Exhibition Hall being located so close to the sessions.

* The interactive presentations.

* The showcasing of whimsical real-world applications.

* The University Booth - where the hearts and minds of the future reside!

Saving the best for last:

EDAC Chairman and Mentor Graphics CEO, Wally Rhines gave a highly regarded keynote address on the first morning of the conference. Here are my two favorite slides from that address:

October 09, 2008Reviewed by 'Couldn't make it to DATE'Very useful for those of us who couldn't make it to DATE. And Peggy always has a way of getting to the right people and to the essence of anything she's writing about. More detail than article coverage in some of the magazines, and the actual dialog was good to see. Thanks. And more from Peggy, please.

October 09, 2008Reviewed by 'Joseph BOREL'Super article giving both the most outstanding messages and presentations and the ambient of the conference.I particularly appreciated the fact that start ups are considered in this paper because in such large conferences they are often simply ignored.I would really suggest that some very selected breakthroughs brought by the start ups be highlighted when significant added performance is demonstrated.I would have lowed to show to Peggy "a fantastic achievement" of EdXact (a new start up demonstrating during the conference, in front of Fenix booth of Hans) that simply adding a "filter" beyond the existing EDA companies extractions tools they were able to reduce the data of a factor of 10 as an average, without changing the simulation accuracy.A 10X gain in the volume of data is a 10X gain in simulation and verification that terribly decrease the cost of your verification/simulation tasks in the flow that accounts for nearly 30% of he overall cost of a design...transparently to your flow !!!!I can supply detailed information if needed.Cordially.Jo